Quote :

"The President of the United States in the name of The Congress takes pleasure in presenting the MEDAL OF HONOR to CORPORAL DAKOTA L. MEYER UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS For service as set forth in the following For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the repeated risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty as a member of Marine Embedded Training Team 2-8, Regional Corps Advisory Command 3-7, in Kunar Province, Afghanistan, on 8 September 2009. When the forward element of his combat team began to be hit by intense fire from roughly 50 Taliban insurgents dug-in and concealed on the slopes above Ganjgal village, Corporal Meyer mounted a gun-truck, enlisted a fellow Marine to drive, and raced to attack the ambushers and aid the trapped Marines and Afghan soldiers. During a six hour fire fight, Corporal Meyer single-handedly turned the tide of the battle, saved 36 Marines and soldiers and recovered the bodies of his fallen brothers. Four separate times he fought the kilometer up into the heart of a deadly U-shaped ambush. During the fight he killed at least eight Taliban, personally evacuated 12 friendly wounded, and provided cover for another 24 Marines and soldiers to escape likely death at the hands of a numerically superior and determined foe. On his first foray his lone vehicle drew machine gun, mortar, rocket grenade and small arms fire while he rescued five wounded soldiers. His second attack disrupted the enemy’s ambush and he evacuated four more wounded Marines. Switching to another gun-truck because his was too damaged they again sped in for a third time, and as turret gunner killed several Taliban attackers at point blank range and suppressed enemy fire so 24 Marines and soldiers could break-out. Despite being wounded, he made a fourth attack with three others to search for missing team members. Nearly surrounded and under heavy fire he dismounted the vehicle and searched house to house to recover the bodies of his fallen team members. By his extraordinary heroism, presence of mind amidst chaos and death, and unselfish devotion to his comrades in the face of great danger, Corporal Meyer reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and the United States Naval Service."

Quote :

"LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- Dakota Meyer saved 36 lives from an ambush in Afghanistan and the former Marine will collect the nation's highest military honor at the White House on Thursday. While he is receiving the Medal of Honor, Meyer's slain comrades will be memorialized in hometown ceremonies at his request. His hero's moment was his darkest day. Meyer lost some of his best friends the morning of Sept. 8, 2009, in far-off Kunar Province. "It's hard, it's ... you know ... getting recognized for the worst day of your life, so it's... it's a really tough thing," Meyer said, struggling for words. Meyer charged through heavy insurgent gunfire on five death-defying trips in an armored Humvee to save 13 Marines and Army soldiers and another 23 Afghan troops pinned down by withering enemy fire. Meyer personally killed at least eight insurgents despite taking a shrapnel wound to one arm as he manned the gun turret of the Humvee and provided covering fire for the soldiers, according to the military. President Barack Obama will bestow the medal at a White House ceremony. The two have also met privately, having a beer on a patio outside the Oval Office on Wednesday. "Over the weekend, the President's staff called Meyer in preparation for Thursday's Medal of Honor ceremony at the White House. Meyer asked the staffer if he could have a beer with the President. POTUS invited Dakota to come by the White House this afternoon," spokesman Jay Carney tweeted. In Afghanistan, Meyer was part of a security team supporting a patrol moving into a village in the Ganjgal Valley on the day of the ambush. Meyer and the other Americans had gone to the area to train Afghan military members when, suddenly, the village lights went out and gunfire erupted. About 50 Taliban insurgents on mountainsides and in the village had ambushed the patrol. As the forward team took fire and called for air support that wasn't coming, Meyer, a corporal at the time, begged his command to let him head into the incoming fire to help. Four times he was denied his request before Meyer and another Marine, Staff Sgt. Juan Rodriguez-Chavez, jumped into the Humvee and headed into the fray. For his valor, Rodriguez-Chavez, a 34-year-old who hailed originally from Acuna, Mexico, would be awarded the Navy Cross. "They told him he couldn't go in," said Dwight Meyer, Dakota Meyer's 81-year-old grandfather, a former Marine who served in the 1950s. "He told them, `The hell I'm not,' and he went in. It's a one-in-a-million thing" that he survived. With Meyer manning the Humvee's gun turret, the two drew heavy fire. But they began evacuating wounded Marines and American and Afghan soldiers to a safe point. Meyer made five trips into the kill zone, each time searching for the forward patrol with his Marine friends – including 1st Lt. Michael Johnson – whom Meyer had heard yelling on the radio for air support. With Meyer and Rodriguez-Chavez ready to test fate a fifth time in the kill zone, a UH-60 helicopter arrived at last to provide overhead support. Troops aboard the chopper told Meyer they had spotted what appeared to be four bodies. Meyer knew those were his friends and he had to bring them out. "It might sound crazy, but it was just, you don't really think about it, you don't comprehend it, you don't really comprehend what you did until looking back on it," Meyer said. Wounded and tired, Meyer left the relative safety of the Humvee and ran out on foot. "He just really took a chance," Dwight Meyer said. Ducking around buildings to avoid heavy gunfire, he reached the bodies of Johnson, a 25-year-old from Virginia Beach; Staff Sgt. Aaron Kenefick, 30, of Roswell, Ga.; Corpsman James Layton, 22, of Riverbank, Calif.; and Edwin Wayne Johnson Jr., a 31-year-old gunnery sergeant from Columbus, Ga. Meyer and two other soldiers dodged bullets and rocket-propelled grenades to pull the bodies out of a ditch where the men had died while trying to take cover. The deaths of Meyer's comrades prompted an investigation into events that day, and two Army officers were later reprimanded for being "inadequate and ineffective" and for "contributing directly to the loss of life." Along with Meyer's friends, a fifth American – Army Sgt. Kenneth W. Westbrook, 41, of Shiprock, N.M. – was fatally wounded in the ambush. Meyer said he'll be humbled by the memory of his fallen comrades as he receives the award Thursday. One of the memorials will be at a Columbus cemetery for gunnery sergeant Johnson, a father of three who served nearly 13 years in the U.S. Marine Corps. Will Duke, one of the organizers, said the memorials spoke volumes about Meyer. "I can tell by his actions, not only the actions he took in earning the Medal of Honor in Afghanistan but also the actions he is taking now. Essentially by requesting these memorial services for his fallen comrades, he's saying this is about them," Duke said."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/15/dakota-meyer-medal-of-honor-obama-beer_n_963905.html

9/15/2011 10:10:28 AM

story gave me goosebumps - that's amazing.

9/15/2011 10:12:58 AM

dude activated Beast Mode

9/15/2011 10:13:49 AM

if that was a movie i'd find it too ridiculous to enjoy

9/15/2011 10:14:48 AM

that dude is bad-ass

9/15/2011 10:16:13 AM

very nice

9/15/2011 10:17:59 AM

I think it's kind of cool the president agreed to have a beer with him. I could see some people being a dick about a request like that.

9/15/2011 10:20:48 AM

The last living Marine recipient of the Medal of Honor was SgtMaj Allan Kellogg, Jr. on 11 Mar 1970.

9/15/2011 10:22:19 AM

Quote :

"if that was a movie i'd find it too ridiculous to enjoy"

9/15/2011 10:22:31 AM

amazing

9/15/2011 10:23:44 AM

Is it weird to anyone else that Obama has been all about giving them out to living recipients after Bush only gave them out to guys who were KIA in Iraq an Afghanistan?

Not to denigrate the 3 recipients under Obama. Also I am such a huge pussy.

9/15/2011 10:28:20 AM

damn that is incredible

sounds like something out of a video-game; hard to fathom someone actually did all that. major kudos and respect.

9/15/2011 10:30:03 AM

dat UAV must have been online

9/15/2011 10:34:40 AM

It wasn't Bush who actually made the decision to award Medals of Honor. It was the former Secretary of Defense under his administration who hardly allowed any to be awarded. A lot of uniformed personnel did a lot of amazing things in both wars that went unrecognized since they were basically commonplace.

9/15/2011 10:41:45 AM

and people say video games don't prepare you for anything

9/15/2011 10:59:21 AM

I'm not buying this story.

Calling BS. Even if it is real, who really cares?

9/15/2011 11:16:20 AM

probably all the people whose lives he saved

9/15/2011 11:29:37 AM

^^ Obvious Troll is Obvious

9/15/2011 11:34:16 AM

Quote :

"dat UAV must have been online"

This is solid gold humor. SOLID gold.

9/15/2011 12:02:36 PM

aahahaha

thepeter, thats EXACTLY what i was thinking the whole time i read that

9/15/2011 12:12:29 PM

Dude sounds like a stand up guy. He deserves some special gold camo and a lifetime elite membership.

9/15/2011 12:14:42 PM

^ "Me-too" joke fails to bring the humor of the original.

9/15/2011 12:15:21 PM

Oh okay. Thanks. I'll write that down.

9/15/2011 12:18:11 PM

9/15/2011 12:20:43 PM

will this be aired?

9/15/2011 1:29:56 PM

I think these are generally aired on whitehouse.gov, the last one was

9/15/2011 1:33:40 PM

Quote :

"The two have also met privately, having a beer on a patio outside the Oval Office on Wednesday."

what is it with the president havin beer. i fucking love it

9/15/2011 1:55:10 PM

^

9/15/2011 1:56:59 PM

WOW

9/15/2011 2:01:19 PM

From http://www.whitehouse.gov:

Quote :

"2:45 pm The President awards Dakota Meyer, a former active duty Marine Corps Corporal, the Medal of Honor; the First Lady also attends East Room Open Press Pre-Set 12:45 PM—Final Gather 2:15 PM—North Doors of the Palm Room"

You can watch the ceremony via live stream: http://www.whitehouse.gov/live

[Edited on September 15, 2011 at 2:03 PM. Reason : .]

9/15/2011 2:02:13 PM

Ok, so it's definitely NOT Dakota Fanning?

9/15/2011 2:09:56 PM

Quote :

"Meyer personally killed at least eight insurgents despite taking a shrapnel wound to one arm"

Blackbird Inbound!

9/15/2011 2:43:01 PM

iddqd amiright?

9/15/2011 2:56:07 PM

dude probably coulda used idkfa too, but he did alright for himself

9/15/2011 4:30:41 PM

Damn. Fuck Superman and Batman. This guy is a real life hero in it's truest sense.

[Edited on September 15, 2011 at 4:51 PM. Reason : ]

9/15/2011 4:50:39 PM

Quote :

"dude activated Beast Mode"

9/15/2011 5:02:48 PM

Rules of Engagement are such Bullshit. Those guys needed air support, but were denied due to the possibility of civilian KIA's. Fuck them, we should always give American lives priority.

9/15/2011 6:27:28 PM

So this happened back in 2009... why did it take two years for him to actually get awarded the medal? Does it normally take that long?

9/16/2011 11:00:01 AM

Quote :

"So this happened back in 2009... why did it take two years for him to actually get awarded the medal? Does it normally take that long?"

If I'm not mistaken there's a fairly long process that they (military branch) go through to vet the nominee. The unit nominates them, and from there it moves up the ranks with interviews given by eye witnesses. I think it has to go through the Secretary of Defense and the President once going through all the military channels. The Secretary of Defense has to approve it then the President has to approve it. Also the higher the award, like the Crosses, CMH, Distinguished medals or the Silver Star (I think that's all of them) require more processes and take longer moving through the system.


In the past few years there's been an overhaul of the awarding system. It had to do with some complaints about what was Valor and what wasn't. Some branches were awarding a bunch of awards and others not so much. Even in cases that were similar action wise the award could be different based on what branch you served. That may also add a little more time to things.

9/16/2011 11:38:22 AM

Quote :

"what is it with the president havin beer. i fucking love it"

It's the most basic political tactic there is. I'm a man of the people, I too drink beer. You sir, do you enjoy beer? So do I.

9/16/2011 11:47:00 AM

The conversation over the beer was likely interesting.

>"So what does it feel like to do something incredible for this nation?"
>>"You'll never know, Mr. President."

trollolololol oBURNma!

9/16/2011 12:03:58 PM

^^ the marine asked him to have a beer. Don't make it out to be some bullshit political move.

9/16/2011 12:03:59 PM

Political tactic =/= political move, in terms of intent.

I don't think there's any underlying reasoning, other than he's a politician. It can only do good to accept the offer.

9/16/2011 12:06:52 PM

or it can be that he's fucking awesome

9/16/2011 12:08:55 PM

^

9/16/2011 12:12:08 PM

Quote :

"two Army officers were later reprimanded for being "inadequate and ineffective" and for "contributing directly to the loss of life"

good, this should have been investigated.

and I'll buy that Marine a case of any beer anytime he wants. Definitely a hero.

[Edited on September 16, 2011 at 12:13 PM. Reason : edit]

9/16/2011 12:12:41 PM

After Corporal Meyer has his beer with POTUS, he's going to give bad-ass lessons to Chuck Norris.

Did any of you hear him talk about how difficult it was? I heard the anguish in his voice, and my heart goes out to him.

9/16/2011 12:14:18 PM

Reminds me of this slayer:




Get's my blood boiling with motivation.

9/16/2011 12:15:11 PM